Multiple wildfires spread quickly through the foothills of the Sierra Nevada in Northern California late Tuesday, with one destroying some buildings in the town of Chinese Camp, a historically significant Gold Rush town.
Nine fires were burning between San Joaquin and Sacramento, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire. They ranged from spot fires of just a few acres to the largest, which had burned about 4,000 acres and forced authorities to issue evacuation orders. Many of the fires were likely sparked by a barrage of lightning strikes that hit California early Tuesday, officials said, and they were zero percent contained by late Tuesday evening.
That biggest fire, called the 6-5, was burning in and around Chinese Camp, an important center of early Chinese American life about 20 miles northeast of Modesto. The town housed more than 5,000 residents during the Gold Rush in the 19th century and was a stagecoach stop that helped link small Chinatowns and multicultural mining towns scattered throughout the Sierra Nevada foothills.
Today, the town has a population of just 61. It is designated as a California Historic Landmark and its buildings include a general store and tavern.
The authorities issued evacuation orders for the residents of Chinese Camp. Another 250 people were also within the evacuation order zone and another 261 were under evacuation warnings, according to a New York Times analysis of the zones and LandScan population data.
Some buildings in Chinese Camp were destroyed by the fire, said Emily Kilgore, a Cal Fire spokeswoman, but added that the authorities did not yet have a clear sense of the extent of the damage.
About 250 additional residents were under evacuation orders or warnings near Kings Canyon National Park.
Ms. Kilgore said it was likely that many of the fires were started by lighting strikes early Tuesday, although investigators have yet to confirm the cause.
Dry thunderstorms rolled through Northern California early Tuesday, and a barrage of nearly 5,000 lightning strikes struck between the Central Valley and Sacramento by 5:30 a.m., the National Weather Service said. Most areas saw less than 0.1 inches of rain, the agency said.
Ms. Kilgore said that firefighters were contending with relatively hot and dry conditions late Tuesday. There was a possibility that there were more fires that the authorities have not yet identified, she added, urging residents in the region to stay aware and to monitor conditions.
Yan Zhuang is a Times reporter in Seoul who covers breaking news.
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